Help's name is Jesus

This post starts with something I’ve noticed in all my years of going to church: no matter who you are – if you have walked through the doors of a church – you are messed up. Yes, you in the suit; and you with your perfect coif and lovely outfit; and even you with the Ipod implanted in your inner ear – come on, let’s be honest – we’re all a little messed. I don’t care if you are the ‘perfect’ suburbanite family or the girl hung over from the night before. Let’s be honest with each other here: you didn’t walk through those doors to “play church”. In truth, you wish the game was over and you could just be real… and get real help for your real-life.

Let’s confront ourselves here: what do we, the Christian community, give people? I mean us, the real people! A lingo and language they’ve never heard before and know nothing about… a code of Christian ethics they may or may not be familiar with… a backing away from the issues they really struggle with leaving them completely alone and without the real tools that God provides them in the Bible… a nicey-nice welcome…. And? For that matter, what do we, the Christian community give OURSELVES??

For those of us who grew up in church, regardless of the denomination, these church-y games are pretty familiar. Sure, we may have to learn a few new things, but on the whole – church is church is church is church. And it’s comfortable for us because it’s not challenging, and aside from a bit of an inconvenience on the weekends where, let’s face it - we’d rather be sleeping in - it’s unobtrusive to the rest of our lives. We almost like that it doesn’t apply – we don’t have to work at anything or ask ourselves any tough questions. We just go, make an appearance, and go back to life as usual.

But what happens when life as usual becomes very unusual? It always seems to, at some point. What then? What happens when we, as church-going Christians end up in the same ‘needy’ boat as all those quote-unquote ‘non-Christians’ out there? By then church is not a ‘help-place’ or a ‘get-real’ place – it’s a ‘church-face’ place. And where’s your church face now? Now that your husband has just admitted to having an affair, or your marriage is struggling, or you’re having a hard time getting up in the morning – what now?

I guess that’s when we just stop coming to church because what will people think? They might ask questions, or even worse, not; and what would we tell them anyway? They don’t really know anything about us. I mean, in our home groups we talk about our kids and our opinions; but nothing past that - nothing really deep. Besides they wouldn’t know how to help us anyway. Look at them! They’ve all got it together – I’m sure none of them have ever dealt with this kind of thing before.

Church is great for those who already have it together… but wait a minute – do any of us really have it together? Hmmmm. Nope. I know I don’t. I have my moments, my weeks where things fall nicely into place, but most of the time, even as a Christian, my life is chock full of the normal things every other person struggles with. Where does a normal person like me go for help?

Where IS this Jesus that used to help people? I thought I could find him at church; but I’ve looked and looked and I can’t find him anywhere. I hear songs about him, I hear preaching about him, I hear people say they are blessed: but didn’t Jesus say something about being able to tell the tree by it’s fruit?? Where’s the fruit of all this love? WHERE’S THE HELP? None of you seem to be able to handle the kind of things I deal with… Maybe I’ll just go back to the quick fixes I had before… only I don’t really want to now…

Let’s be direct here, can we? Church can be, SHOULD be fun. And coupled with that, with just as much urgency and importance, church SHOULD be helpful. Church should empower us, give us tools with which to live our lives. We certainly get none of that in the world.

And let’s ask the hard question: what good is God anyway if knowing him doesn’t improve our lives?

I watch so many Christians; everyone seems to know the God-language of ‘being in God’s will’ and ‘being blessed’ and ‘praying’ and all of that… but if you take a moment to look at their lives, so many are drowning in oceans of low self-worth and fear and rejection. Their marriages are tepid at best, completely falling apart at the worst. They are struggling with affairs, lust and pornography. Their children are running amok. And I find, no one wants to say anything because “ things SHOULDN’T be like that”.

I think “shouldn’t” should be eliminated from our vocabulary as humans on this earth. WHAT?! What do you mean you shouldn’t be struggling? Where is there room for the healer? Where, in your hurting heart, have you left room for the one who can help?

Everything we’ve been taught tells us that we get the most approval and make the most friends when we’ve got it together. And so we’ve developed all these survival mechanisms for ‘keeping’ it together, or at least keeping the appearance up. Just call them and give a good excuse – no one will ever know.

WHERE IS THE GOD OF POWER? WHERE IS THE GOD OF LOVE? AND WHAT GOOD IS LOVE IF IT DOESN’T DO SOMETHING FOR YOU?!!!

I’m sorry: I can hear your trained-up Christian brain churning… rebelling against the very questions it asks in wordless cries at powerless times… because they’re not right!! They’re not the questions you should ask. Good Christians just ‘follow Jesus’, not ask questions. If church is boring and I get nothing out of it, than that’s just the way church is; and if Jesus seems out-dated and antiquated, than Jesus is just irrelevant and that’s just the way it is; if my life is in total disarray, than that’s just God’s will for me, and on the days it’s really bad, that’s him punishing me for…. well, whatever he wants, really. He is God, you know. He can do whatever he wants… it’s his timing, his will, his way. I don’t even really count except to be his servant… whatever that means, really.

I just want to ask: when was it that we came up with our own language that lets everyone talk and no one communicate? When did we say that telling it how it really was, was uncool and that really ‘good’ Christians just kept all that bad stuff hidden? When did God become so disempowered in our eyes that we couldn’t just be where we were and come to the throne of grace and receive his love and his mercy? When did God jump out of our hearts, where he is ‘said’ to live, and into the eyes of other people, so that he could judge us based on our supposed good works?

We, the church, have got it wrong. We have stripped God of his power with our denial and saving face. We have reduced Jesus to a name that we sometimes mention in prayers and sporadic Bible studies. The Holy Spirit is just someone who kind of tags along with the other two – we don’t really know what he does, but apparently, he’s a good guy and all in the name of good Christian living.

Let’s face it: we as the church don’t really want to attract those ‘bad’ kind of people… we don’t really want to deal with any ‘issues’, because honestly, what would we do? What would we say? We only want to deal with the things we’re familiar with, and stick straight to the Bible, straight to the Word of God!

Hmmm: what does that mean? What good is the Word of God if it doesn’t help set people free and love them and let them be safe for the first time in their lives? Who do we think Jesus was? Why did all the outcasts of society feel so comfortable with him? Was it because he smelled nice? Or maybe, just maybe, it was because they had been so rejected by the religious people of the day that it was refreshing to find someone that talked about God, and loved them at the same time. Cared about, found solutions to, talked about – their infirmities… their sicknesses… their addictions.

Let’s change. Right now. Let’s change things to the way they were intended to be. Let’s open the doors and fling open the windows to the messy, ever-present, wind blowing, mind numbing, heart rending love of God. Let’s invite the glorious, bone-chilling, heart-melting presence of Jesus into our lives in whatever way we know how… to my brother with whom I share everything. Let’s bring the real God in, God the relevant! Let’s search out the ways he changes me! What does he bring? How can I live my dreams and be myself? Does he teach me how to do that? Is it possible that he is for me in every way that a person can be for another person? Is it possible that the sheer act of letting him love me could change me so much that everyone around me might not even recognize me?
LET’S ASK OURSELVES THE QUESTIONS THAT WILL BRING LIFE:
What does it mean to experience God? How do I do it? Is it just a mystery or is it something I can do everyday? Does the presence of God ‘fall’, or is it something I can feel and experience all the time? Who is this Jesus anyway? And what does it REALLY mean to be ‘in Christ’? I hear so many people talk about it – but I still see miserable marriages and people struggling in every area of their life. Jesus said he wanted us to have life and have it more abundantly. Then how come most of the Christians I know seem uptight and afraid of having fun or money?

“That’s the problem with the church in America. We are all information and no power. The frustration of most Christians is that they cannot get what they know to work. The answer is not to learn more. The answer is to find ways to grow in what we do know. Paul said it this way, "For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power." 1 Corinthians 4:20. ~www.impactministries.com

Here’s the truth about Jesus. The truth is that knowing him is the most freeing, exciting thing that can ever happen to a person. The truth is that getting saved takes one’s life on a path never before imagined by your poor, tired brain and only imagined by your sweet, underused heart. The truth is that Jesus will be the only one in your life that will always be for you, mistaken or not, the one that will always stay with you on your side, mistaken or not, the one who will never forget you and will always be walking with you down the path that you most want to go. He is… ever. He is… now. He is… love. And you don’t even know what that means yet. You’ve never felt anything like it because he takes your already tired definition of love, and blows it right out of the water into a million stars that take an eternity each of them to explore, each one shining brighter and delving deeper than the ones before it. He shows you the world in every touch of his hand, and brings you on the wings of your dreams into a dawn of hope that you were just too afraid to imagine. He is love, brilliant, violent, ear-splitting, mind-numbing, heart-shattering, tear-inducing, all-enrapturing love… that makes your most insane and extraneous dream come true turning you into the epitome of stature and love in the process.

There is nothing or no one like Jesus. We have made him irrelevant, powerless, iconic, pasty, mean, vindictive, aloof, uncaring, indifferent- we have killed him. Not just once, but twice. And the sad thing is – he’s not dead!! He’s alive, active, interested, involved, attendant, entertaining, vibrant, excited… and ready to interact… with you!

The Bible says, Seek and you will find. You WILL find. Ask the life-giving questions. You WILL find – Him. Love. Mercy. Forgiveness. Excitement. LOVE.